Don't Starve

Don’t Starve is a survival game that takes the word “difficult” and multiplies it by 50; “unforgiving” is the word that first comes to mind while playing this game. For all its difficulty and various ways your character gets killed the game is a joy to play. A randomly generated world filled with resources to collect, structures to build, and objects to discover awaits you each time to start a new game. Can you survive for more than just a night? If you can, then a rich gameplay experience awaits those intrepid explorers willing to siphon hours into this delightful gem. This is the kind of game that players will get lost in figuring out where to find their next meal, collecting enough kindling and wood to keep a fire going through the night, and making a swift return to their base camp before the darkness descends. If “permadeath” is in your regular gaming vocabulary then Don’t Starve should be in your library of games. When your character dies it’s game over and you must start a new world from scratch. Don’t be put off by this mechanic though; death in Don’t Starve doesn't lead to broken controllers and dreams. You’ll find yourself compulsively starting again and tackling this dangerous world with renewed vigor. Don’t Starve is a must play game for players who are fans of the exploding survival genre.

Pros:Open world to explore and secrets to uncoverPleasing graphics and soundGame keeps bringing you back to keep playing

Cons:Crushing difficulty that at times seems unfairAbsolutely no player guidance may lead to frustrationPermadeath may be too harsh for casual players

Score:8.5/10

Graphics:Don’t Starve is visually fully of whimsy. You won’t find GPU-punishing eye candy here; the world is a 3D playing field but crafted to look more like moving paper cut outs than real life representations. Factor in the weird residents of the game world, the obtuse combination of resources to craft objects, and the overall bizarre atmosphere of the game and the graphics work wonderfully. They’re no technological marvel but the visuals all work together to create a unique experience each time to venture out into the world. The muted color scheme at first captures the bleakness of the Gothic inspired world but after more than a few hours of play begins to look simply bland. It's by no means an ugly game, it just loses it luster after a while. You must juggle the multiple needs of your lone character
and the game represents graphically what needs your attention the most.Taking too much damage imposes a red ring
around the edge of your screen.If you
fail to keep an eye on your characters mental health meter the world slowly
becomes fuzzy and viscous and nightmarish shadows begin to creep around the
edge of your view.Left unchecked those
shadows become real and in turn really dangerous so be sure to keep them figments
of your imagination and not flesh and bone foes.The game does a beautiful job of letting you
know how your character is fairing without having to glance at your meters
often allowing you to focus on actually playing the game. The overall graphic fidelity of the game, while not
breathtaking, is simply wonderful and full of small details that it’s obvious independent
developer Klei Entertainment took their time crafting this game. Everything has a cell shaded or hand drawn
look about it and nice touches such as trees swaying gently in the breeze or
the map transitioning from dense forest to arid desert to murky swamp ensures
you’ll always have something pretty to look at.
While the game visuals aren't anything we haven’t seen before the entire
look of the game is cohesive and well thought out and collectively the graphics
work to create a real sense of the game world. I have very few gripes about the graphics of this game as
everything you encounter is displayed well.
However, I found it hard to determine what some of the icons represent
in your inventory and thankfully the game displays the name of the selected
object or resource above the tool bar.
Your first few attempts at the game will undoubtedly be mucked up as you
select the wrong item or think you have the required ingredient to build
something when you don’t. Some icons
look uncannily like the icons for different resources which I found slightly
annoying. On more than one occasion I
found myself in trouble as I scanned my inventory looking for a torch or a
weapon to equip and got killed because I wasn't quick enough. Especially when you’re equipped with a
backpack and the icons become even smaller, your inventory becomes difficult to
navigate and the darkness may come and kill you instantly because you simply weren't swift enough to find your torch.
Even for these small gripes the graphics of the
game are wonderfully drawn and everything in the game runs smoothly with crisp,
fluid animations denoting the on-screen action.
Most of the action you’ll be privy to is cutting down trees for wood or
collecting grass and twigs to start your nightly fire with some simple button
mashing combat thrown in. Don’t Starve won’t melt your monitor but
it will fill your screen with its unique look and you’ll be hard pressed to
pull yourself out of this odd comic book world.

Sound:You won’t find much in the way of speaker-shattering sound
in Don’t Starve, but what you do hear
is quality enough to know what’s going on.
Your character, unfortunately, doesn't speak any lines; all you get here
as you observe the game world is text above your character’s head as they sing
out a series of musical tones. Each
character’s “voice” is distinct though so at least you get some variety
here. Maxwell, your starting playable
character, has an oboe-like voice while Willow, a little girl character that can
be unlocked, speaks with a piccolo-like voice.
It’s much like Banjo Kazooie
in its vocal capabilities and works surprisingly well to create a unique
personality to each character through sound.The lack of human vocalization adds further intrigue to a world already
filled with many questions and not enough answers. Your ears will also be treated to more subtle sonic
sugar.Your footsteps will make distinct
sounds as you travel over different terrain such as the rustle of soft grass
while traversing over grasslands or the click of your heels on paved
roads.Cutting down trees will produce a
satisfying hollow thunk as your axe
blade hits wood and ambient sounds will play dynamically as you explore the
various biomes of the world.Birds and
crickets chirp in dense wooded areas and frogs and some unseen animal make guttural
sounds in the marshes.These subtle
noises really bring the world to life and are never overbearing or out of
place.Much like the graphics you won’t find anything about the
sound that is neither stellar nor disappointing.Everything works as expected and all sounds
are high quality and distortion free.Aside from rabbits sounding like squealing pigs, the sound of the game
is just right.The music changes on the
fly as well, playing a jaunty tune during the relatively safe daylight hours
and becoming more somber and slow as dusk turns to night.The soundtrack picks up during combat encounters
with the various denizens of the game world, inhabitants that are either
outright combative or docile until attacked, and plays a tense tune to suit the
mood.Small touches and subtle sound cues are a real joy to listen
to while playing Don’t Starve,
however, like the graphics, nothing here is absolutely superb.The sound is high quality, well recorded and
implemented expertly and works to further pull you into the game.Nothing sounds out of place and the music and
auditory cues work in harmony with one another to alert you of danger or
safety.What really mends together the
graphics and the sound is the game play; as you navigate this hostile and
unforgiving world you’ll rely on both sight and sound to help keep your
character alive for one more night.

Gameplay:Don’t Starve
really finds its footing from the moment you take control of your first
character.The so-so graphics and
utilitarian sound on their own don’t do much to create a great game; here it’s
the player that takes the mundane and transforms it into something
spectacular.After a short loading
sequence as the computer stitches together your game world the screen fades in
from black to reveal your character unconscious on the ground.A mysterious man materializes and simply
states “You don’t look so good.Maybe
you should find something to eat” and then disappears.And that’s all you’re going to get as you
start the game up.No pop-up tutorials,
no mini-map with markers, not even a compass to help you get your
bearings.You’re literally dumped into
the game and left to figure it out on your own.The basic idea behind the game is to collect the various resources you
find in the world and use them to craft weapons, armor and clothing, and a “Science
Machine” that unlocks more advanced structures and refined basic materials.Combine some wood, grass, and poop to make a
farm to grown your own food though at a very slow rate.A sharp flint stone and a branch makes a pick
axe to mine for stones for more permanent home goods.The premise is simple, it’s only complicated
by the fact that everything in this game will try to extinguish your meager little
life. And you’ll be lucky if you survive even the first night on
your very first time playing. Once your
character expires it’s game over. You
can start from a previous save but I prefer to just left that story thread end
and start over, this time equipped with the knowledge that attacking a bee hive
is almost certainly a death sentence or that the sentient pigs you find roaming
about will fight back when you get the hankering for bacon. Each time you die in Don’t Starve you’re one step closer to a longer period of survival
and as you watch the day counter tick up to one day over your previous session
the sense of accomplishment is palpable.
My current longest time spent alive in the game is a mere 14 days and
this is after hours upon hours of playing the game, experimenting with
different methods of survival, and approaching problems from different angles. Everything in the game seems out to kill you;
even the darkness of night is an enemy of its own that you’ll be desperately
keeping at bay, slowly doling wood into your fire pit as you attempt to conserve
resources. Your own stomach is also out
to get you. Do you eat all the food you
found today or try to ration yourself to keep your stocks up? And how long do you hold onto your food
before it spoils? Every aspect of the
game requires you to find equilibrium between exploration and survival and you
never get the balance quite right.
Eventually your house of cards will crumble but how long you keep
entropy away will be your marker of success.
I know that I promise reviews of games after I complete or
almost complete the main story thread, but Don’t
Starve is such a wonderful amalgamation of mechanics that I can’t help
myself from writing this review. I’m
sure there’s a story buried underneath all the layers of this game but I just
haven’t found it yet. The game gives you
glimpses of great things to come only if you can stay alive long enough to suss
it all out. I keep finding a gold ring
that I’m still not sure what to do with and most recently I found a hand crank that
I’m positive would have been useful if demons didn’t swoop out of the marsh I
was exploring and strike me dead. It’s
in all these little moments of discovery and defeat that keeps pushing you to
have another go at Don’t Starve. I don’t even know what prompted the skull
faced demon attack and I’m sure I don’t want to find out, but eventually I’m
certain I will and maybe at that point be prepared enough to deal with
dispatching them for good. It’s the
sense that the answer to a question is right around the bend in the road or
under a suspicious looking pile of dirt that will keep you returning to Don’t Starve to uncover the truth. I was unsure if the permanent death mechanic was going to be
something I found frustrating or rewarding, and truth be told, I find it to be
one of the absolute best thing about the game.
Each trek outside your base camp runs the real risk of losing everything
you worked for so you mull over the options at your disposal. Do I equip my weapon and try to kill a
man-pig for meat and risk getting killed over a tummy filling meal or do I play
it safer and scour the woods for seeds and berries that don’t provide much sustenance? Each decision you make will have consequences
and many are unforeseen. That tryst out
into the forest could lead to a deadly attack by bees and suddenly what was
once considered the safe bet now is tainted by a game over screen. Conversely, defeating a pig and cooking up
the huge chunk of meat and being full for the entire day is a small victory
that keeps driving you forward. The game is simply a joy to play. I used a game controller as I found it the
easiest and most natural way to control the game. The left analog stick is used for navigating
the world, the right stick for scrolling your inventory. The left trigger brings up your crafting tool
bar and the right trigger pauses the game and allows you to rearrange your
inventory. The mouse and keyboard may
work, and some may even find it superior, but for my play style a game pad
comes highly recommended. If you’re
living situation is like mine where you have multiple family members around the
house, the game pad is also the less obnoxious choice if someone is sitting in
the same room as you trying to watch TV or a movie. Chances are you’ll be furiously mashing away
at the keyboard and mouse and making a huge racket. The game pad ensures you’re frustrations are
at least quietly executed even though your shouts of disappointment will be
heard by your whole town.

Final Thoughts:It’s strange that a game so punishing as Don’t Starve is actually a game I keep going back to time and again. Simply trying to find enough food to last one more day is enough to keep me playing, story and secrets that remain yet unseen be damned. The simple victory of besting nature just one more night is compelling enough to keep you coming back to the game. The player is what really makes Don’t Starve a must play game. You control your destiny, you control your fate for the most part; the game will ultimately get you when you’re unprepared or desperate but it never feels totally unfair. “Of course I should have brought a weapon with me” or “I knew I should have made room for seeds and berries” are thoughts you may have as you watch your character perish at the mercy of the game world. But even though you bested your previous survival record and thought yourself finally in touch with the game mechanics enough to keep going you’ll simply accept your fate and try again. Don’t Starve is what makes me applaud independent game development. You don’t find EA or Bethesda pouring time and development into titles such as this and you won’t find the experimentation and break from tradition from big name titles either. Klei Entertainment is nimble enough to create a game as compelling and entertaining as Don’t Starve and this is the kind of game you absolutely must play. It’s less of a game and more of an experience. Even after hours of play time I’m still barely scratching the surface and the developers continue to support their title with updates that I’m not sure I've even experienced yet. I found a magical door to a 5 world survival trial but was too scared to enter. I've found the opening to caves but felt too unprepared to deal with whatever was lurking down there. Maybe one day, when I finally have enough pieces of the puzzle to fight my way out of more than a paper bag I’ll attempt these excursions. For now I’m content to explore on my own terms keeping the darkness of night at bay to survive just one more day to see what else the game has in store. It’s for all the reasons I've mentioned that you should put money down on Don’t Starve. The middling graphics that aren't anything spectacular and the sound effects that are nothing out of the ordinary weave beautifully together once the player takes control. The sense of accomplishment staying alive for one more night and your attempts at bending the game world to your will are where this game skyrockets out of mediocrity and into the stratosphere of every stellar video game ever designed. Trying to do this game justice with words is like trying to capture lightning in a bottle; if you succeed you've done the outright impossible. Every nuance is stitched together with precision and purpose and each time you fail you’ll dust yourself off and tackle this punishing game over and over until you eke out a simple existence and equip yourself with enough tools and knowledge to venture far beyond the borders of your base camp to discover everything Don’t Starve has to offer. I can say with confidence that this is a game you simply must purchase and play and can do so without buyer’s remorse. You’ll find hours of entertainment and loads to discover each time you attempt to live just one more day in Don’t Starve.